THE MAIL HELPING THE HOMELESS Malcolm Gladwell makes the compel- ling argument that developing perma- nent supportive housing for those who have experienced long or repeated epi- sodes of homelessness is a fiscally and morally responsible approach ("Million- Dollar Murray," February 13th &20th). However, we shouldn't have to choose, as Gladwell suggests, between dealing with either the ten per cent of "chroni- cally' homeless individuals or the other ninety per cent who have brief episodes of homelessness. Thousands of low- income and middle-income households fall into homelessness because of un- manageable housing costs or financial emergencies. By focussing almost exclu- sively on the costliness of allowing "chronically' homeless individuals to re- main homeless, Gladwell does not touch on the enormous expense of allowing the other ninety per cent, which includes more than a million children, to cycle in and out of homelessness. Without ad- dressing larger systemic issues, such as insuring access to affordable housing, living-wage jobs, and health care for all, and exercising the political will to solve them, our country cannot realistically hope to end homelessness. Maria Foscarinis Executive Director, National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty Washington, D. C. Many financial costs associated with homelessness, such as health care and law enforcement, can indeed be ad- dressed by power-law analysis. But financial costs are only one reason that homelessness is a social calamity, and, for many advocates, probably not the most important one. The solutions that power-law distributions offer will have an impact on the lives of only those few whose behavior is expensive and socially disruptive, without addressing the less dramatic plight of the vast ma- jority of individuals and families who are occasionally homeless, and whose situation remains a disgrace to Ameri- can society. The "average" homeless person's suffering and its causes should still matter to us, and we must rely on our principles, not our statistics, to make that difference clear. Mark Vanhoenacker London, England ASBESTOS CLAIMS As a former staff writer who published a number of articles in The New Yorker about the medical and legal impacts of asbestos disease, I would like to com- ment on James Surowiecki's favorable review of the Fairness in Asbestos In- jury Resolution Act-a bill that pro- posed to settle all present and future asbestos-disease claims with a trust fund of $140 billion but that recently failed to pass in the Senate (The Financial Page, March 6th). According to five indepen- dent analyses, the trust fund would have become insolvent within a few years, amassing a debt variously estimated to be between $8 billion and $150 billion, which would have been borne by the na- tion's taxpayers. (Indeed, the fund's size was determined by asking asbestos man- ufacturers and their insurers how much they would be willing to pay to elimi- nate their liability, rather than consider- ing how many people might develop as- bestos disease.) Surowiecki suggests that "unimpaired" asbestos claimants should not receive settlements, but it is impor- tant to note that the great majority of these claimants show X-ray evidence of asbestosis-an irreversible, progressive disease that worsens with time. People with permanent lung damage should not have to wait until they encounter difficulty breathing, or have developed lung cancer or mesothelioma, before being compensated. Paul Brodeur North Truro, Mass. . Letters should be sent with the writer s name address and daytime phone number via e-mail to themail@newyorker.com. They can also be faxed to 212-286-5047. Letters may be edited for length and clarity and may be published in any medium. 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